


Creature Comforts

by Tyellas



Category: The Shape of Water (2017)
Genre: Animals, Cute Ending, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Inspired by Fanart, Post-Canon, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, bored in paradise, is it kidfic if it's the MEEPS, is it mpreg if the Asset's gender is variable
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-16
Updated: 2018-04-16
Packaged: 2019-04-23 11:22:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14331381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tyellas/pseuds/Tyellas
Summary: In a hidden Amazon paradise, life is perfect enough to be boring. Left to herself for a day, Elisa goes hunting for something to cuddle and look after. For the rainforest has creatures that go mew, rrrrowr, hiss, nom, squeak....andmeep.





	Creature Comforts

**Author's Note:**

> I couldn't resist this lighter story for Elisa...especially the ending. Inspired by [undergroundwubwubmaster's](http://undergroundwubwubmaster.tumblr.com/) delightful art of some possible [Asset Babies](http://undergroundwubwubmaster.tumblr.com/tagged/asset-babies) followed by this [headcanons post.](http://undergroundwubwubmaster.tumblr.com/post/172534900587/if-you-dont-mind-do-you-have-any-headcannons-on) Thank you so much, UWWMaster!

It was another perfect day in this hidden Amazon vale. The dawn chorus of birds had died down, leaving insect song mingling with the whisper of the rainforest’s canopy. If Elisa dipped back into this river, the pristine waters of an Amazon tributary would be all around her, sleek and cool, making their own liquid music in her ears. As it was, she perched on the river’s edge, on a little crescent of dark sand. Soon, the beachlet would hold the warmth of the sun.  

Was she allowed, Elisa wondered, to be a little bit bored in paradise? 

Usually, when Elisa felt like this, she would have slipped off and watched the River People. She’d learned a lot from them. But she and the creature had moved away from the River People. A hunting party had sought and found the two of them. They’d done the only thing to do, then fled for deeper, safer forest. In their new home, they’d celebrated their safety by making love in every nook and inlet. Exhausted after all the excitement, they had curled up in the silken silt of a black lagoon for a long nap.  

Elisa had awoken as refreshed as if she'd slept for a year. Perhaps they had. The world around them had returned to being quiet and peaceful. After their sleep, the creature had – well, he’d wanted some space, today. Elisa had learned to let him have it. Sometimes, he loved to course the river, reveling in his own strength, at one with the water. Other times, especially recently, he craved very strange things to eat. He’d looked a little bit stocky around the waist lately, too. Zelda had said that happened to everyone when they settled down with a partner. Elisa didn’t mind one bit. It was more of the creature to love.  

Elisa would use times like this, when she was on her own, to lounge and explore on land. The creature had changed her so she could live fully in the water. But she could go where she pleased on land, too. Her past friends, Zelda and Giles, even that nice Dr. Dimitri, came to mind more on land. Elisa missed them, suddenly. This new Amazon refuge had no signs of any River People at all. She hadn’t even heard any airplanes flying overhead. Elisa hoped people were all right, wherever they were...  

Thinking of Giles, she remembered Giles’ cats. That was it! She should get a pet. Something she could cuddle and look after. It would need to be a certain size to keep the creature from mistaking it for a snack. But that could be arranged. Elisa took off into the deep rainforest, a silvery shadow dancing among the trees.

Elisa adored the rainforests. They were deep, magical, woven with vines, fragrant with rot and blossom, cathedrals of green pillars and leaf-filtered light. In their rich dampness, the creature could stay on land far longer than he had back in Baltimore. It was the end of the dry season, the time when the jungle’s animals came down to the river’s edge. When the flooding returned, Elisa and the creature would swim gleefully between the tree trunks, and the land animals would depart. But they were here now.  

Walking along, Elisa heard a rasping _mew_. Then a second one. A cat! Giles would laugh, she was finally ready for a cat. Amidst the green-curtained trees and lianas, Elisa followed the _mews_ up a tree trunk that had toppled against another tree, creating a ramp. There was a messy nest at the top, scratched out of the rotting wood of the fallen tree. Elisa peeked inside.

Three lonely jaguar cubs, surely orphans like herself, delighted her. Two of them, one spotted, one entirely black, were dozing. The third blinked at her sleepily, young enough that its eyes were still blue. It flexed its spotted paws, stretching adorable toe-beans at her, with a _mew_.  For one ecstatic moment, Elisa picked it up and held its furry warmth. It licked Elisa's arm and began to purr.  

Just as Elisa was wondering if she could adopt them all, she heard another noise, a sustained rumbling. Was that an engine? Elisa looked around and gasped. The cubs weren’t orphaned. Their mother, as strong and sharp-toothed as her own dear creature, had returned. As the jaguar roared, Elisa thrust the cub at her and fled. She dared to look back once. The jaguar mother was holding her offspring down, relentlessly scrubbing it of Elisa’s flavor. Elisa dashed back to the river and swam across it to break her scent trail. 

On the opposite bank, Elisa caught her breath. That had been her fault. She couldn’t blame a mother for defending her babies. She’d befriend an _adult_ animal next time.  

Elisa’s eyes, keen thanks to the creature changing her to see underwater, caught another movement. It was a second cat, even prettier than the baby leopards. This one had the proportions of a grown animal, just like Elisa wanted. She – Elisa felt this cat was a she – was lithe, pretty, elegantly spotted. The cat was framed between some leaves, its sleek tail twitching, raptly watching a bird on the river. So raptly that Elisa could slip behind her, to pick this one up for some petting, too.  

The moment Elisa laid hands on soft fur, the animal spun. RRRORWWRRR! Elisa jerked her arm back to find it bleeding. She'd been slashed by small but sharp claws. The tiny, pretty cat was standing her own ground, back arced, teeth bared, shrieking. RRRRRRRR! RRRREEEEOWWWW! Elisa backed away. Maybe this was why people didn’t have pretty Amazon cat-pets in America. With a final hiss, the cat vanished like smoke in the forest. 

Elisa let go of the idea of having a cat. Surely there was another, more reliable sort of animal out there. Above her, a branch moved. She looked twice. It wasn’t a branch: it was one of the big, sleepy snakes, an anaconda. How had she never noticed how beautiful they were before? Moving like oil poured out of a jar, patterned in darkest greens that reminded her of the creature, gazing with wise, timeless eyes. When she lifted her arm, the snake’s tongue flickered out, scenting her. It descended.  

How sweet! It wanted to hug her right away! Elisa embraced it back. The large snake responded by wrapping its coils around her more thoroughly. After another happy moment, Elisa decided it was, perhaps, hugging her too hard. It was a good thing the creature had made Elisa’s slim limbs stronger, too. It was a lot of work to extract herself from the anaconda’s cuddles. If it had been larger, Elisa might not have managed it, but it might not have been so tame, either. Regretfully, she let the snake, too, spill off into the forest.  

Elisa trailed along the river’s edge. Idly, she picked some rumberries from a tall shrub leaning over the water. Most of the time she was happy sharing the creature’s high-protein diet (except for the insects). But they both craved fruit occasionally. The creature liked it less often than Elisa, but would bite at far more types of plants than she did, including water weeds and flowers.  

As Elisa picked fruit, the bush rustled. A long striped face peered out at her, a rumberry in its muzzle. It dropped the berry with a squeak, but didn’t run away. Elisa offered it a replacement berry. It took it. A second, third, and fourth berry were welcome, too. In a few moments Elisa had a friend patting gentle paws against her knees. This animal was almost exactly like a stretched-out cross between a cat and a raccoon, with a long, ringed tail. 

Wait – now there were two! Elisa fed them both. Turning around, she found there were four. No, six. Oh dear. Giles’ cats could be bad enough when it was feeding time. She tried shooing the extra furry animals away and realized she couldn’t tell which one had started it all. Picturing a whole jungle’s worth of these creatures chasing her constantly, Elisa threw her handful of rumberries one way and leapt the other way, back into the river. When she lifted her head from the water to peek back, ten hopeful striped faces were peering at her from the river bank. 

Elisa found herself back on the beachlet where she’d started. She sighed, very deeply. No pets for her.  

Then, she heard a new sound, a trilling squeak. 

Elisa looked around to see where it came from. It was not from the land. A new animal was paddling her way in the water. It clambered out to sit beside her, fearlessly. It was large, the size of a dog, but with the blunt face of a guinea-pig. Water streamed off its toast-brown coat and its long eyelashes.  Like the creature, it was chewing on some water weeds. Elisa dared to pet it. The capybara fluffed up its fur to nudge into her touch, squeaking in bliss. Best of all, when Elisa swam away, it followed her. When they went to another landing, Elisa kissed it on its forehead. It uttered another happy trill and lifted its head for more.  

Elisa spent the rest of the afternoon following it or being followed by it, watching how it ate, seeing how peacable it was. Whenever it settled outside of the water, other creatures took shelter by it. That behavior made her unsure if it was a pet. It felt more like...a friend.  

By sundown, when Elisa was feeding it tender grasses, he came back: her mate, her own dear creature. Elisa loved him all the more after her refreshing afternoon’s exploring. She waved and pointed at the capybara. _Friend!_ she signed.  

The creature, she noticed, was carrying something. He had his trim dancer’s waistline back, his body’s lights racing, and a very smug expression on his face. He went right to Elisa, making a noise she’d never heard before: _meep! meep!_ Reaching out as he came, to put that something in her outstretched hands.  

Elisa went electric with delight. She hadn’t been this astounded since she’d met the creature in the lab at Occam so long ago. For she held a chubby, big-eyed miniature of...him.  

The infantine amphibian squirmed in her grasp. It was half the size of a human baby. It had a tadpole’s tail and exploring hands. There were cunning translucent fins in teal and cream, a cherub’s mouth with a wee slip of tongue peeping out. Gazing up at Elisa, it uttered one chirp. _M_ _eep?_  

Elisa’s heart melted. She pulled it close. The little one realized she was warm and nestled against her, cooing. Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness! Had the creature carried them inside him, like a seahorse father, or had there been some secret hidden nest? Was she their father or mother or – she didn’t care. As before, Elisa was simply, completely, utterly enchanted.  

Elisa heard another _meep_. While she’d been falling in love with the darling in her arms, the creature had _three_ other baby creatures with him. He had placed them to nestle against the capybara. Their friend placidly let them pat and clamber all over its fur. 

The capybara gazed up, unperturbed, as Elisa showered kisses over it, over the little ones, and most of all, over her beloved creature. 

**Author's Note:**

> Elisa tries befriending:  
> \- Jaguar kittens  
> \- An [oncilla](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oncilla)  
> \- An anaconda  
> \- [Coatimundis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_American_coati)  
> before she meets the [capybara.](https://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/animals/stories/5-things-you-didnt-know-about-capybaras)
> 
> Remember our piscine heart-throb here is gender-fluid, according to Del Toro. "It’s not explicit in the movie, but in large swarms of fish, they switch gender if they need to..." In fish with asexual reproduction, the reproduction is often triggered by the physical act of mating with another fish, not necessarily of the same -ahem- species. But, honestly, who cares? I just want to smoosh those adorable amphibian baby cheeks!


End file.
